Six Texas State faculty members have been awarded a scholarship that will send them to different corners of the world to teach and research.
The Fulbright Program, supported by the U.S. Department of State and J. William Fulbright Foreign Scholarship Board, admits and sends 800 professionals to around 130 countries to conduct research or lecture in varied fields and professions.
Daris Hale, Fulbright campus liaison and senior lecturer in music, said Texas State’s number of participating faculty in the program is on par with John Hopkins and Columbia University. Texas State is expected to be listed as a top producer of Fulbright Scholars by the Chronicle of Higher Education, according to Hale.
“Texas State faculty are highly qualified and are very competitive when placed against other national scholars in the Fulbright proposal process,” Hale said. “We have the reputation as being a Fulbright-friendly institution by having policies that support our faculty while they are working abroad.”
Elizabeth Bishop, associate professor of history, will work at the Université d’Oran in Oran, Algeria, to address African-American nationalism. Bishop has previously been named a Fulbright scholar, where she taught literature and history in Algiers, Algeria.
Bishop said the increasing number of Fulbright scholars is important to note in the university’s plight to become a tier-one research institution.
“The number of those affiliated with our university and are awarded Fulbright grants in any given year is an important indicator of our mission as a research-driven university,” Bishop said.
Bishop is not the only returning Fulbright scholar. Roseann Mandziuk, professor of communication studies and 2011 Fulbright scholar, will be spending spring 2019 in Chennai, India. Mandizuik’s short courses and workshops at the M.O.P. Vaishnav College for Women will discuss cultural and rhetorical studies.
Mandizuik’s said her primary goal is to create international relationships to further conversations of research and ideology.
“I hope my Fulbright serves as a bridge between the students and faculty in India and our institution, providing a sharing of ideas and hopefully establishing lasting connections for future exchange,” Mandziuk said in an email. “I am interested in making connections between communication researchers in India and those in the U.S. Our common disciplinary interests can be widened and deepened.”
Holly Wise, journalism and mass communication lecturer, will be going to India. Wise will teach solutions journalism, a solution-based approach to critical journalism, at Mt. Carmel College in Bangalore, India.
“India lends itself to great storytelling opportunities,” Wise said. “Many of the news articles coming from India tend to be negative, and solutions journalism is a great tool to learn about the innovation taking place within the country and to highlight how people are responding to social problems.”
Other professors leaving to teach abroad are Caitlin Gabor, Paul Jantz and Joellen Coryell.
Caitlin Gabor, biology professor, will be conducting research in Budapest, Hungary, at the Hungarian Academy of Sciences. Gabor will study concerning anthropogenic effects on declining amphibian species through land use conversion.
Paul Jantz, associate professor of counseling, leadership, adult education and school psychology, will spend 10 months in Hanoi, Vietnam, to assess how traumatic brain injury may affect psychological functioning in children.
From the same department, associate professor Joellen Coryell will teach and conducting research in Rome, Italy, concerning the internationalization of higher education.